Friday, July 28, 2017

Ninja Theory’s Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice received some particularly good looking gameplay footage a few days ago. The developer has now released an official trailer for the game showcasing the depths of Senua’s madness and the lengths she goes to. Check it out below.

It’s actually pretty sad but the overall quality of the visuals and facial animations make it simply phenomenal to watch. There’s also the fact that the developer worked with neuroscientists and people who actually suffered from psychosis to properly capture the inner workings of Senua’s mind. Though suffice to say that it’s far from being a happy place.

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice has been in development for a long time and comes from the same studio behind Heavenly Sword, Enslaved: Odyssey to the West and DmC: Devil May Cry. Despite seeing numerous delays, it’s finally ready to release. You can pick it up on PS4 or PC via Steam on August 8th.

Bungie’s Destiny 2 is a little more than a month away but more information is emerging. The recent San Diego Comic Con saw Bungie hold a panel and it showcased some footage of Zavala rallying the troops. Check it out below, courtesy of DownhillDuff1024 on YouTube.

Filmed off-screen, the trailer sees Zavala talking about the destruction of the Tower and how he requires Ikora and Cayde-6. The setting is Titan, a moon near Saturn, and we could be looking at a new social space for players to investigate.

It’s also possible that the cinematic is taking place during a campaign mission and perhaps somewhere fairly early in the game. What’s especially cool is seeing the scene itself followed by Lance Reddick in the recording booth and the motion capture artists creating the scene in studio.

Destiny 2 releases on September 6th for Xbox One and PS4 while the PC version arrives on October 24th.

Ever wanted an Uruk that was completely unsure of himself when threatening to kill you in Middle Earth: Shadow of War? Kumail Nanjiani provides just that as The Agonizer, a crossbow wielding Uruk who wants to be bad-ass but isn’t sure of himself. Check out some of Nanjiani’s performance below which could range from cool to awkward depending on your sense of humour.

Middle Earth: Shadow of War is a follow-up to Shadow of Mordor with Talion returning to control the armies of Mordor against Sauron. The Nemesis system has expanded to include the entire game world and you’ll be leading charges against Keeps to take control and strengthen your influence. Thankfully, Celebrimbor is still on your side and helps forge a new ring for this purpose.

Though originally scheduled to release this month, Middle Earth: Shadow of War will be out on October 10th for Xbox One, Xbox One X, PC, PS4 and PS4 Pro.

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Ghost Games’ Need for Speed Payback has received a new trailer showcasing the range of customization options that players can employ for their cars. Rav ‘The Alchemist’ Chaudhry is on hand to detail the various options and makes sure to note that everything can be earned with “time and skill”.

With five different classes, namely Race, Drift, Off-Road, Drag and Runner, and the ability to customize each individual part, there’s plenty of potential to make a car your own. Furthermore, like Forza Horizon 3, you can find scrapped cars in the open world, bring it back and transform it from a stock car to a supercar. Winning races will allow you to pick up parts, which is pretty much what you’d expect.

Need for Speed Payback is out on November 7th for Xbox One, PS4 and PC. It will feature three characters to play as with their own skills and who must work together to successfully complete missions.

Respawn Entertainment’s Titanfall 2 has received its latest free update on all platforms and it’s quite meaty. Operation Frontier Shield brings Frontier Defense, the 4 player co-op Horde mode from the first game, to Titanfall 2.

Frontier Defense will be available for five maps currently but more will be added in the future. Along with the usual sentry turrets, players can use Arc traps to fend off waves of enemies that include enemy Titans, Grunts, Stalkers, Reapers and so on. Aegis Ranks are earned for completing matches and they can lend more upgrades to one’s Titan.The update also brings a new map Rise, remastered from the original Titanfall and also available in Frontier Defense, along with Township, a Live Fire map taking place in a residential area. You can also look forward to the usual bug fixes and changes like the Phase Shift ability now having only one charge but recharging faster. Weapons like the G2 now have reduced fire rate while medium and long damage on SMGs has been “significantly reduced”. Check out the full patch notes below for more information.

Game Improvements

Added more out of bounds triggers to Complex.

New stats page for maps, including tracking of Frontier Defense difficulty levels.

Visual improvements for Weapon and Titan stats pages.

Titan BalanceGeneral

Ogre class Titans now have a baseline of 1 dash with a 10 second cooldown.

Turbo Engine will now reduce cool down of Scorch and Legion’s dashes to 5 seconds. It will still behave the same as before for other Titan classes.

Overcore now gives 20% core meter.

Electric Smoke unlocks at 20% instead of 25%.

Ronin

Sword Block damage reduction reduced by 5%.

Scorch

Scorch will now have 1 dash charge with a 10 second cooldown.

Increased Firewall’s width.

Scorch Kits

Wildfire Launcher now increases the direct-hit damage of the Thermite Launcher. It still increases the amount of fire spread.

Scorched Earth’s lingering fire lasts longer.

Tempered Plating now makes Scorch immune to crits and his own thermite damage.

Fixed a bug with Flame Core not igniting Incendiary Traps.

Legion

Legion will now have 1 dash charge with a 10 second cooldown.

Hidden Compartment: Power Shot has two charges and Power Shot damage is reduced by 15%.

One of the positive changes we saw in the High TTK playlist was the increase of weapon diversity. It is our hope that between the Aim Assist nerf and this SMG nerf, we’ll see weapon diversity increased across all three platforms.

G2

Reduced fire rate.

DMR

Reduced fire rate: In this particular instance, we felt that the reduced fire rate simply made the gun feel better since the gun stabilizes better between shots.

Flatline

Slightly reduced damage at medium range. It still has the best medium range damage of any Assault Rifle.

Archer

No longer locks onto cloaked targets.

Smart Pistol

No longer locks onto cloaked targets.

Sidearms

High TTK playlist changes for the P2016, Wingman, Wingman Elite, and Mozambique have been brought over to bring their power level down now that all Pilots can carry a secondary weapon.

Melee

Lunge time and melee hit frames changed to .3 seconds from .2 seconds. This will help people firing weapons, particularly automatic weapons, get extra shots in before the lunge completes.

Melee lunge range reduced.

Non-lunge melee attack range increased. This will help with the cases where melee looks like it should hit but doesn’t connect with the target.

Game Mode Adjustments

Various improvements to the UI for Private Match, including increased visibility of text chat on PC.

Misc. Bug Fixes

Fixed issues with purchasable Nose Arts not showing up correctly on Titans.

Spectators in Marked for Death can no longer be marked for death.

(Xbox One) Buttons and pod doors in War Games intro sequence now play at the correct volume.

New footage from Nintendo’s Super Mario Odyssey has emerged from San Diego Comic Con 2017 courtesy of Yoshiller on YouTube. The footage sees Mario exploring New Donk City, running into Pauline (who’s the mayor) and Captain Toad and finding several different Moon Pieces. Mario also takes the opportunity to jack some guy’s scooter because he’s Mario, damn it.

Super Mario Odyssey sees our favourite plumber return in a 3D platforming space but this time, he’s packing a hat that can “capture” various people and creatures. This allows Mario to transform into a car, a Bullet Bill, T-Rex and so much more. What little we saw of the mechanic from E3 2017 looked fun and we can’t wait to see how it translates over into the main game.

Despite the next few months being busy with several big-name releases scheduled, Super Mario Odyssey will be coming out on October 27th for the Nintendo Switch.

Monday, July 24, 2017

While this year is going to be a quieter year for Take 2, after the delay of Red Dead Redemption 2 into next year, it sounds like 2018 is promising to be a pretty big and eventful one for them. Not only is Red Dead Redemption 2 going to be out then, but it sounds like Take 2 is teasing another ‘huge title’ for next year, too.

“Obviously fiscal 2019 will look much better with the launch of Red Dead 2 and a huge new title from 2K, as well as the 2K Sports titles, catalogue, recurrent consumer spending, NBA2K Online in China, Social Point and the like,” Take 2 Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick told GamesIndustryduring an interview.

The question is, what Take 2 game qualifies as being ‘huge’? The Rockstar properties, obviously- but Red Dead is already accounted for in that statement, and it is all but impossible that Rockstar also launches a brand new GTA game next year. Their next biggest properties are Bioshock and Borderlands– and with the former franchise being on somewhat of a hiatus, doesn’t it now sound likely that Borderlands 3 is what is being teased for a release next year? Especially since we already know that the game is under development currently?

If you weren’t on board with Monster Hunter World already, I need to ask you to put aside your fanboyism and actually consider the game for what it is- a fantastic looking full next generation realization of the Monster Hunter formula. And if you’re not convinced already, then maybe this new video for the game, with off screen footage captured at SDCC 2017, will be the thing that finally brings you on board.

The footage shows us various weapons in the game, and how they feature in the game’s incredibly fluid combat- Monster Hunter has always had great combat, but it has been slow and deliberate, which has been a barrier to entry for many players. Now, the combat seems fluid and swift, and even long time veterans are likely to be excited with what they see.

You can check out the footage for yourself below. Monster Hunter World is the fifth mainline entry in the series, and is due out on the Xbox One and PS4 early next year, with a PC release following shortly afterwards.

Sonic Mania, the upcoming 2D platformer from Sega that promises to be a full fledged return to the glory days of Sega’s spikey blue mascot, is almost here – it launches next month, at long last! – and at San Diego Comic Con, Sgea shared some new screenshots for the game, showcasing some of the special stages that will be in it.

You can check out the screenshot below, but that’s not all, either- there’s more Sonic Mania goodness, because a video for the game was also shared, sharing with us some of the music that will play during the special stages. If you are down for some 16-bit musical goodness, fire this video up- it’s the perfect blast from the past for Sonic‘s Genesis glory days, and the new tune captures the essence of the old music perfectly.

Sonic Mania is due out on the Xbox One, PS4, Nintendo Switch, and PC on August 15- will you be getting the game? Make sure to let us know in the comments section below.

Team Ninja’s Nioh received some new gameplay for the Defiant Honor DLC which is releasing on July 25th. As part of a recent stream with directors Fumihiko Yasuda and Yosuke Hayashi (start here for the actual gameplay), we got to see the new levels and tonfa weapon in action. Just be warned that there are spoilers, especially when it comes to the boss battle.

However, perhaps the bigger announcement is the upcoming third DLC for the game. It’s called “Genna Enbu” or “Genna Armistice”, which takes place in the Sengoku Era where civil war is pretty common place. As the final DLC for the game, it will likely see William’s story come to a close. How that will happen and under what circumstance remains to be seen but new enemies, locations and much more are expected.

As for Defiant Honor, it will be out tomorrow exclusively for the PlayStation 4. It sees Sanada Yukimura preparing to fight against the Tokugawa clan’s forces outside of Osaka Castle as tensions mount between the Tokugawa and Toyotomi. William teams up with Date Masamune of the Tokugawa to face Sanada and find Maria. The setting is Winter and you honestly can’t get any more dramatic than that.

Nintendo’s Splatoon 2 had a fairly strong start in the UK as per the latest charts from Gfk Chart-Track. It wasn’t enough to counter the onslaught of Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy which saw its sales rise by 60 percent to claim another yet another week at number 1. This means it has as many weeks in the UK no. 1 position as The Last of Us: Remastered.

Still, Splatoon 2 managed to earn second place with Grand Theft Auto 5 in third. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe saw a 60 percent uptick in sales and is thus in fourth place with Overwatch in fifth. Keep in mind that because Blizzard’s digital PC sales are not divulged, the actual number could end up being much higher.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild rose to sixth place thanks to a 20 percent increase in sales. Final Fantasy 12: The Zodiac Age dropped from first to seventh place with sales dropping by 85 percent. FIFA 17 is in eighth though followed by Fallout 4 and LEGO Worlds in ninth and tenth respectively.

Akira’s Mysterious Fighting Game isn’t called that – that’s just the game’s working title, we don’t actually know what it will be called when it finally releases – but that’s all we have for now, so we’re running with it. Anyway, we have received a brand new video for the game, which gives us 50 minutes of gameplay footage for it.

We get to see some of the fighting and gameplay styles we can expect in the game- it looks like the kind of game that may end up piquing the interest of a lot of folks who are into the competitive fighting game scene. But of course, until we actually get to play the game, it is hard to know either way.

You can check out the footage for yourself below. Akira’s Mysterious Fighting Game is due out exclusively on the PlayStation 4 worldwide some time in 2018. As the name suggests, it is going to be a game by Akira.

Sunday, July 23, 2017

Capcom’s Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite continues to expand its roster with the latest gameplay trailer featuring some new additions. Check out the trailer below to see Haggar (Final Fight), Frank West (Dead Rising), Nemesis (Resident Evil) and Spider-Man in action.

A good amount of the trailer also features Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy along with the Mind Stone and it’s incredible powers. As for the voice lines…well, just try your best to ignore the voice lines.

Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite is a continuation of Capcom’s famous crossover fighting series, even in the absence of series mainstays like the X-Men. The Story mode has been given a large amount of focus this time around as heroes from the Marvel and Capcom universes fight the seemingly unstoppable Ultron Sigma. That’s the combo of Marvel’s Ultron and Mega Man X’s Sigma.

Releasing on September 19th, Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite will be available for Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

Most people on dedicated gaming communities hate the game, and most critics barely acknowledged it- but the most successful game of the year so far has been Ghost Recon: Wildlands, which Ubisoft released in March this year, and which remains the highest selling title worldwide of this year so far. I suppose the allure of a fully co-op GTA style game is too much to resist for the masses.

Now, Ubisoft will add to the game’s appeal, by adding a Call of Duty like appeal to it, too- a PvP mode, long requested by fans, is coming to Wildlands this Fall. The new mode will be called Ghost War.

“Our objective with Ghost War was to build upon the main game’s elements of co-op teamplay and open, tactical gameplay,” said Lead Game Designer Lucian Istrate.

A beta for the game will be coming soon, so keep an eye out for that- meanwhile, you can check out the trailer for Ghost War for yourself below. Ghost Recon Wildlands is available on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.

Paragon, Epic’s MOBA/hero shooter fusion that is available on PS4 and PC, will be getting a major update that will make far reaching changes to the game. Thee changes will not just be graphical, significantly improving and changing how the game looks, but also have significant impact on how the game plays and on how it is balanced.

The changes include entirely new itemization via a new card system, rebalanced in game economy, full gameplay rebalance, new mastery system, and much more. There are also changes to the graphics, which you can see for yourself via the new screenshot above.

You can find the full patch notes (well, technically not full, but they’re what we have from Epic) for the update for yourself below. Paragon is available now on PS4 and PC. Are you excited for this update? Make sure to let us know in the comments section, and stay tuned for more coverage.

In the September issue of gaming magazine Edge, Jim Ryan from PlayStation, was asked about his thoughts about the PS4’s future exclusive line-up and why Sony’s first party game studios haven’t been able to deliver many exclusives every year. Given that Sony have so many exclusives such as Persona 5, Nier Automata and Horizon Zero Dawn released this year, I wonder why there are claims of lack of exclusives.

Ryan addressed these claims by stating that the exclusives are there but they haven’t been vocal about it.”We probably haven’t been sufficiently vocal about a year in which we’ve had Horizon Zero Dawn, which has been a hugely successful new IP. We’ve got Uncharted: The Lost Legacy and we’ve got Gran Turismo Sport, all in the same year, all from our studios, all exclusive to PlayStation. I think that’s a pretty decent statement,”he stated. He also added that the line-up for 2018 is looking “very strong.”

Sony’s line-up for 2018 is indeed quite strong so I don’t quite understand why there are claims out there stating the PS4 doesn’t have many exclusives. Ryan also stated that he’s not sure whether they will do another iteration of the PS4.

“I think we’re only six months into PlayStation 4 Pro, and it’s too early to tell. The Xbox One X hasn’t launched yet. I don’t know if this is the way forward or not.”

Sony have already confirmed that there will be a PlayStation 5 and according to a popular industry analyst, it will be backwards compatible with the PS4. In my opinion, I don’t think there will be anymore PlayStation 4 iterations after the PS4 Pro…a PS4 Pro slim may be, but definitely not a specifications iteration.

Monday, July 17, 2017

The latest UK game charts courtesy of Gfk Chart-Track are finally available and Final Fantasy 12: The Zodiac Age is in first place for the week ending July 15th. Interestingly enough, this is the first number 1 selling game for Square Enix since Deus Ex: Mankind Divided released last year.

Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy was forced to third place thanks to Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare rising back to second place with various retailer promotions. Overwatch is in fourth place with sales having increased 82 percent week on week. Grand Theft Auto 5 is in fifth place and shows no signs of leaving any time soon.

Meanwhile, Forza Horizon 3, Minecraft: Xbox Edition, WipEout: Omega Collection, Horizon: Zero Dawn and Injustice 2 round out the rest of the top 10. There aren’t a ton of major releases this week aside from Splatoon 2 on July 21st so stay tuned for more information on how that does in the coming week.

The recent EVO 2017 fighting game tournament had a ton of blockbuster news for fans, including announcements for Bandai Namco’s Tekken 7. As it turns out, the next add-on character for the title has been revealed and it’s none other than Fatal Fury’s Geese Howard.

A major antagonist in SNK’s Fatal Fury series and father to Garou’s Rock Howard, Geese represents an incredible surprise for Tekken 7. Though Capcom has collaborated with SNK numerous times, especially with its crossover fighting titles Capcom vs. SNK, this will be the first time that Bandai Namco and SNK work together.

As for Geese, you can check out his moves in the trailer below. He moves and looks really good in Tekken 7, showing off his power moves and aggression. There’s no real release date for the man but you can bet that he’ll be coming real soon.

What are your thoughts on Geese joining Tekken 7’s roster? Let us know in the comments below.

Jotun developer Thunder Lotus Games has announced that its next title Sundered will be releasing on July 28th. It will be available for Mac, PC, Linux and PS4. If you still have a chance, then head over to Steam or GOG and pick up Jotun: Valhalla Edition for free to celebrate.

You could also ogle the stunning new trailer for Sundered which features beautiful hand-drawn art and showcases some of the cooler “Metroidvania meets rogue-lite” mechanics that can be expected. Given the combat in similar games like Dead Cells, it will be interesting to see how Sundered can match up but so far, it’s looking really good.

Sundered is currently available to pre-order on the Humble Store, GOG and Steam for 10 percent off. If you pre-order it on Steam, then you receive the soundtrack for free along with the discount. What are your thoughts on the trailer and the game as a whole? Let us know below.

Bungie’s Lars Bakken hasn’t had the most enviable job in the past few years. As the Crucible design lead, he’s been responsible for numerous changes in Destiny’s PvP modes, buffing and nerfing weapons as seen fit. As such he’s had to deal with a lot of flak over the years but with Destiny 2 on the horizon and so many changes being made to Crucible, why would Bungie choose to revamp PvP entirely?

Bakken spoke to DailyStar UK about this and said, “There’s a lot of people that internally were like ‘why would you change this thing that people obviously enjoy’ and the answer is it’s not as good as it could have been. The answer is even though we created something that you know millions of people loved, I was never happy with what we created and I always wanted to make something better and so it was easy for us to talk about how can we make this better.

“Like, how can we make this for people who really enjoy PVP, because I think with Destiny 1 we talked about it in a way where it was important for everyone who wanted to play anything, it was like come on in, let’s give everyone a big hug. That felt good in some ways, but it also caused some strange problems, long form problems that we didn’t necessarily see until later after the game had been out. And we wanted to try and tackle some of those things and like rethink from first principles like how do we want the crucible to work in Destiny 2.”

As for concerns about this community-oriented game that will only support 4 players per team in Crucible – which can be an issue when you’ve built a standard 6 person fireteam over the years – Bakken said that, “It’s absolutely a concern, but when you need to make a change, sometimes there are bones that needed to be broken and that can be painful but if it’s the best thing for the experience sometimes you have to do that in order to give the game a focus and the necessity of what is going to give players the best possible experience.

“We’ve created it for eight players, that is our target and it allows us to do this really great thing as developers to say hey every map or mode we create, we know the target number of players. We don’t have to have a variety of experiences that this thing has to support, it is laser focused on being the best thing it can be with four Vs four.”

Destiny 2’s open beta will actually go live on July 18th, 10 AM PST for those who pre-ordered on PlayStation 4. Xbox One users join on July 19th while the open beta is available for all on July 21st.

Sunday, July 16, 2017

Although Sony has had a great 2017 so far, the PS4 has no major AAA exclusive games penned for release this Q4, except Gran Turismo Sport. In a way, Gran Turismo Sport has a huge responsibility of pushing the PS4 sales further for all the important Holiday season. Things become even more challenging if one puts Forza Motorsport 7 into the equation.

So the PS4 may not be getting as many Holiday exclusives as the Nintendo Switch or even the Xbox One this Holiday- but against the latter, at least, it should have no problem holding its own, according to Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter. Pachter believes that despite having just one big exclusive, Sony will counter the Xbox One X and Switch by dropping the PS4 and PS4 Pro’s price.

‘I don’t think Microsoft is all that competitive,’ Pachter said. ‘Xbox One S is priced the same as the PS4, and I don’t think they are competitive at all with the Xbox One X, currently priced at $100 more than the PS4 Pro, and highly likely to be priced $150 more than the PS4 Pro by Holiday. My guess is, Sony will cut the everyday PS4 price to $249, and the PS4 Pro price to $349 this Holiday, and Microsoft will be too expensive, so Sony will keep its price advantage this Holiday.’

A price cut sounds like the simplest, easiest thing Sony can do to cushion the impact of the Xbox One X- plus, doing so will also make the differences between the PS4 Pro and the Xbox One X less pronounced, since they will be priced appropriately, too. It would definitely be a smart move for Sony.

The latest Xbox One firmware update comes with quite the bevy of features. The main appeal seems to be custom Gamerpics which is a fancy word for allowing users to upload their own profile pictures. These can be uploaded from an Xbox One, Windows 10 PC or your smartphone. Keep in mind that your picture should adhere to the Code of Conduct since all users will be able to see it.

The July update also allows Mixer users to co-stream, which means that up to four players on their own Xbox One systems can stream together while in a party. Those watching can then see a split-screen of all the streams taking place. It’s also worth noting that households with multiple Xbox Live users can now allocate a gamertag to a specific controller. Use that controller to sign in and it will be the corresponding gamertag.

The Xbox App is also being updated to allow Game Pass subscribers to look through the library via their smartphone. You can also change regions for the store and share LFG requests either publicly or with friends.